Scottish indie-poppers Camera Obscura have announced the release of their collaborative single with man of Sheffield Richard Hawley. You may remember that Hawley was slated to produce one of the band's records in the past, and Tracyanne Campbell has often spoke of her love for Hawley, so it was always going to be an issue of 'when' rather than 'if'.

Entitled 'The Nights Are Cold' and backed by/along with 'The Sweetest Thing', the 7" sees Camera Obscura covering Hawley and Richard returning the favour by remixing 'The Sweetest Thing', a track taken from their 2009 record My Maudlin Career. It'll be released on May 17 through 4AD.

Carey Lander of Camera Obscura said:

"I think the first time I heard of Richard Hawley was when our album Biggest Bluest Hifi came second to his Late Night Final as the Best Album Of The Year in some Spanish awards thing. I borrowed the album from Kenny and listened to it, hoping it would be rubbish so I could dismiss it and proclaim dramatically that we'd been robbed. Unfortunately, it was the record to have most excited me on a first listen ever. It went straight on repeat, I wrote him an e-mail of gushing admiration and phoned Tracyanne to tell her I'd heard something amazing and would bring it round to her house as soon as possible. Tackling a song from a record we love so much was quite daunting but I hope you like our version and enjoy the coupling of it with his remix of us."

Cover art is below:

Want to know/remember what the original versions sound like? Then look no further. Well, maybe a little bit further...

Camera Obscura head out on a lengthy tour of the US in a few weeks, details of which can you view here but they play at the Pavement curated ATP festival in May. Though if you don't already have a ticket then that's a fairly useless piece of information because the last time I looked it was sold out. As for Hawley? He starts a European tour in mid-May but also makes a solitary festival appearance at Suffolk's Latitude.